Sai, seer or revered mortal: It’s about personal faith

A visit to our avowedly Hindu home would definitely leave the esteemed Shankaracharya of Dwarka quite annoyed. No, we don’t have a gigantic photo or statue of his current bugbear, the Sai Baba of Shirdi in the living room, but like many a catholic Hindu – pardon the phrase but it is truer than it seems – I festoon my home with divine visages. And the irate seer may not be happy to hear that all those diverse deities actually reinforce my Hinduness…

There is a mother of pearl Mary and Jesus in my house, with “Our Lady” written in Arabic as I was presented the icon by a nun in Damascus. Three decades ago I was told to keep her in an elevated spot and she would forever bless and protect my home. I did and she has. And in another equally exalted spot is the image of Ma Kali, made out of scrap paper by a Muslim vegetable vendor’s wife. For me, both are (wo)manifestions of the same female force.

Besides these ladies, from Buddha to Nanak, every faith that can have a visual representation is present, all of them enhancing rather than hindering my prayers every day. Nor do they seem to be irked about being placed in such proximity all around my house. So it seems more than a little silly that a mere mortal – which is what the Dwarka seer also is, after all — has been taking umbrage on behalf of a section of them against another!

The greatness of Sanatan Dharma is that people like me don’t have to listen to the diktats of the clergy, no matter how grand their self image. It’s entirely voluntary. Just as Uma Bharati is not obliged to heed the Dwarka sadhu’s admonition about “worshipping a Muslim”, it is certainly not blasphemous in my reckoning to equate Mary (the catholicism here is only partly thanks to a convent education!) with every Bengali’s Mother Goddess, Durga, and Ma Kali.

The absence of a uniform “church” and the multi layered styles of worship in Hinduism make it the most democratic and broad based “ religion” ever, actually. No baptism, bar mitzvah, no rites of passage really except for the Brahmins, who in any case are in a minority in the religion. For the rest, Hinduism is what you want it to be… With some heartening extensions, such as Bengal’s syncretic Satyanarayan Puja, which reveres a Muslim called Satya Pir.

Indeed, instead of targeting the Shirdi Sai Baba devotees for worshipping a human as a God the Dwarka Shankaracharya should actually draw a bead on Bengalis. There is scarcely a Bengali who does not have images of Sri Ramakrishna Parmahansa and Ma Sarada in her home, vehicle and workplace. Then there are Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, Sri Aurobindo, Baba Lokenath and more. The list of revered mortals is pretty formidable in Bengal.

Yet Bengalis are also equally devoted to Kali, Durga, Shiva and Krishna so calling us apostates would also not do. And excommunicating us -had Hinduism had such a convenient device – would seriously deplete the ranks of the religion, which would not be in the seer’s interest either. It is also supremely ironical that the Shankaracharya’s attempt to create a sectarian schism would probably be welcomed by the fundamentalist Islamic clergy, who have no love lost for Sai either.

If the Shankaracharya thought it through a bit more, he may have – or should have – encouraged the assimilative instincts of Hinduism rather than told them to batten down the hatches against outside influences. As caste barriers fall thanks to urbanisation and modernity, what better hope for a liberal, expansive common faith than the historical precedent set by Hinduism of coopting new gods, beliefs and philosophies? I shall pray to Mary and Ma Kali that he sees the light!